


Chilblains

by sleeplittlechild



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Self-Harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-03
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-16 13:21:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29825562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleeplittlechild/pseuds/sleeplittlechild
Summary: Isolated in the north, Essek starts to spiral downwards. Thankfully, Yasha notices when they get back.
Relationships: Essek Thelyss/Caleb Widogast, The Mighty Nein & Essek Thelyss
Comments: 6
Kudos: 121





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [moonmoonandthemorrigan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonmoonandthemorrigan/gifts).



The first time is an accident, really. Traveling to and from the Dynasty and the Lucid Bastion carries risk with every casting. It was not Essek’s intention to arrive miles away from the relative warmth of Vurmas, nor had he planned on appearing in the middle of a raging snow storm.

There were no landmarks to be seen, leaving pushing ahead as the only option really. Out of the storm, in relative shelter where Essek could rest and try again in the morning, was the best solution. He had not made it far from his arrival - the wind buffeting him with no reprieve that he lost concentration and fell. His hands sunk into feet of snow - the scream tears out of his throat. He recognizes the pain long before he recognizes that he’s on the ground. He struggles to breathe, to remember the spell that has become easy as a cantrip for him. There are false starts, there are gasps as the air freezes his lungs, but he does manage to rise again. Keeping that concentration is all he can do until he collapses in a outcropping of stone, hours later.

He sleeps soundly that night, curled into a ball with his hands tucked into his chest. It’d been the best he’d slept since Nicodranas.

He had gotten back to Vurmas the next morning. Uraya had scolded him into finally donning the fur-lined cloak resting on his door since he’d first arrived. And Essek spent every calm moment looking at the purpling bruises fading down each finger. The knuckles creaked when he waved over a book. He could feel a tingling, just under his skin, when he reached for a component. Uraya had warned that the cold would stick with him for probably the rest of the day as he pushed a cup of tea towards the Shadowhand.

The second time was an experiment. At least that’s what he would tell anyone who asked, which would be nobody. The scholars the outpost employed to keep track of weather patterns warned of a blizzard incoming, strong and predicted to last at least three days. Measures were taken that the excavation crews could wrap up quickly and return to shelter, or that those in too deep would have supplies to wait it out. Repairs were made to barracks that needed it, windows shuttered and the like. When the snow began to fall, everyone was safely inside.

Hours later, with only the wind to hear, Essek stepped out into the thoroughfare.

Immediately, the wind rammed into him. It sunk beneath his cloak, snaking tendrils under his mantle and stinging his very skin. It pushed back and he stumbled on his backfoot into his quarters. Essek could think of nothing but the biting cold, a proverbial beckoning finger of a good night’s sleep.

He collapsed into the snow again, this time after an innumerable amount of time standing in the storm. His fingers had crossed from purpling into a dull ashen color at that point, swelling at each knuckle. His ears prickled, that only one sharp turn would shatter them. Essek crawled back to his quarters’ door, his legs asleep and frozen too weak to hold him up. He cried in trying to grasp the door handle and the tears froze in their path. It hurt worse to try and cast, so he suffered the throbbing ache that wrenched sobs from inside him to bend his fingers and _push_.

The door opened and he stumbled inside into an ungraceful heap. A roaring fire brought all the pains to a brand new level, suddenly revitalized from numbness to make him recognize them. With the smallest strength he had left, Essek shoved his shoulder against the door to close it and screamed.

Essek couldn’t you when the sobs turned from physical pain...to all the pain he had refused to feel before. He could only tell you that one moment he was staring at his broken fingers, about how idiotic he was for destroying the tools of his livelihood, and the next he was thinking about a hand cradling those fingers, a gentle hand that came with a gentle smile and trusting eyes. Eyes that had turned away from him when he revealed himself to be everything he always was. A traitor. A liar. A coward.

Essek fell asleep in the entryway, with a blissfully quiet mind.

The third time was intentional. As was the fourth time, the fifth time, every time until Essek lost count. There were moments when Essek would stare down at his ashen skin and tell himself that this was the last time, that he would not risk his usefulness at this outpost just for another mind numbingly empty night.

But he could not stop the giddy feeling, when the scholars warned of another storm.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After the Nein returns and Essek joins the party into Aeor.

Coming into the Ruins of Aeor was an extensively bigger challenge than the Nein had originally conceived. It was a whole city, Jester pointed out. There was going to be more to explore, even before they got to whatever it was that the Tomb Takers were after. That also meant they had to be more careful with their spells.

That’s why they decided against polymorphing down a level and instead, gathered whips and ropes to make a ladder.

Yasha positioned herself at the end, finding a strong rock or pillar to secure it. Surprisingly, Essek kept it tight and Jester had taken the opportunity to rib Caleb and Fjord about it and the chatter echoed off the walls, far-away and indecipherable. Yasha’s focus was elsewhere. Finding an anchor point, yes, but something else.

There was a strangeness to Essek’s hands. Long and slender, even under leather gloves, but they’d been that way since The Nein had met the drow. (Yasha used to think magic stretched you out, that that was why the elves were so tall and slender.) No what was strange was their movement - slow and deliberate, accompanied by a wince that Essek had never had before. Not the man who showcased his magic like a performer. He was just as reluctant as Caleb or Jester to expend any energy towards magic, but it didn’t seem to be the same apprehension of what was on the horizon. Yasha thought it seemed more...physical.

She found a chunk of wall that had crumbled in just a way that she could wedge a knot and hold the rope. As she finished, Yasha saw Essek let go of the rope and re-adjust the cloak over his mantle. His sleeve slid down just so small, but it was enough to see the discoloration between arm and wrist.

Cracked, rough skin - so thin it was hanging off in bunches. Yasha had seen it in the Wastes, when the traveling was rougher and shelter not so readily comed-by. What Essek, pampered as he was by his position, was doing with such injuries was the question that kept needling at her as they descended.

It was after fighting what could only be described as Not-Wolves that Caleb sat to cast the Dome, the Mansion being sacrificed for a speedy escape. Yasha didn’t mind entirely - it allotted for a chance to answer that question.

“Essek, could you stay up with me? Take watch?” Yasha asked, as Jester bemoaned what magic she had and had not used that day.

Out of any of the Nein, Essek must’ve been very surprised that such a request would come from her. Any of the other ladies or even Caleb and his brows probably wouldn’t have shot up _quite_ that high. Either between the soft question or his still-lingering guilt, Essek still agreed.

In the recent days, The Nein took their time falling asleep, between not knowing if Lucien would stumble upon them, what else might be lurking underground, and general uneasiness. What dreams their Empire members might have had them all bunched together. Beau laid against Yasha’s back, snuffling like she could push her face _into_ Yasha. It was cute, so Yasha didn’t dislodge her and tried to move slow enough through her pack.

“When I was traveling,” She began, as if they’d already been talking, when she found the right jar, “we weren’t always able to bed down away from the elements. So the Shaman of my tribe came up with a cream that would help against the cold.” She placed it between them and began unscrewing the lid. “May I see your hand?”

Essek gobbed at her. Yasha felt her insides turn watching him, like this was a fight she should run from, like she had done something wrong. Was there a cue she had missed, something she had said? The lid was already off, and just as Yasha was going to put it back on, Essek laughed - mirthless and glum. It made Yasha pause. Essek brought one hand, closest to her, up to his chest. The fingers flexed close and Essek grimaced. When they opened again, he tugged the fingers and eventually the whole glove off.

It was worse underneath.

The sagging skin had popped and peeled back in spots - whether from repeated exposure or from the friction of the gloves, Yasha couldn’t tell - and the knuckles had swollen that Yasha winced in turn. Three of the knuckles were accompanied by bright blisters that might’ve been infected, if Yasha had better light to see by. It was without a thought that Yasha took the hand - gently, she reminded herself at the last second. While she was rushing ahead, she had to remember - gently - and let what small amount of healing magic she had to flow into the drow. The same hollow laugh echoed as they both watched the skin knit itself back together, the blister less angry, the swelling less visually painful. Not healed, but better.

Yasha spared a look to Essek when he laughed. He wouldn’t look at her. So she allowed him the same courtesy and dipped a finger in the cream. The first pass elicited a hiss, Essek instinctually pulling back. It was cold, Yasha gave him that, but she held him still. It was a silent exchange, almost like a massage. She paid close attention to his knuckles, rolling the bones between the fingers until his face lessened from pain to uncomfortable, leading him to clenching and unclenching with more ease than before. Without a word, as Yasha finished with one hand, Essek gave his other one and Yasha transitioned seamlessly. This one was just as bad, just as damaged, just in different places.

“It was easier...to cry. When I could feel the pain, on the outside”

That gave pause. Yasha’s head sprung up so quickly, her braids knocked into Beau behind her. “Sorry, sorry. Shhh, go back to sleep.” Beau grumbled and shifted. When Yasha was sure she was asleep again, she looked at Essek. He actually looked back at her, trying for a smile that he in no way actually felt.

“So...you...did you do these to yourself?”

Essek swallowed over the lump in his throat. “There are plenty of storms in Eiselcross.” Was all he provided.

The words mingled themselves in her head, trying to sort themselves out. It was...actually, it was a feeling she could recognize, funnily enough. Recently, too. Something she grappled with everytime they came to combat, her friends far away and in trouble and she too helpless to help them. She focused on spreading the cream against the blisters.

“When I escaped…” She tried to pick her words carefully. “When the Nein saved me, from The Angel of Irons, I...my first instinct was to run. To get away and never hurt them again.” When she chanced a look at Essek, she found him nodding. Agreeing. _Empathizing_. “But I had missed so much time with them. But I still hurt and….and I wanted retribution. On me. On my actions, what I had done.”

Yasha gathered both hands in one grip, using her free one to look through her pack. “So, when we were Rosohna, we found an underground fighting ring. And I just...I just let them go to town, on me. I barely even fought back.”

Essek blinked at her. He probably was trying to picture it, Yasha thought, and smiled at his confusion.

“How...how did you feel, afterwards?”

Well, that certainly wasn’t the question she expected. Not to be said so eagerly, anyway.

“Better.” Yasha admitted. “I felt like….I don’t know, like I had paid my penance. Like I was finally damaged, as much as I had damaged others.” Yasha found what she was looking for - bandages. 

“Like you deserve it.” The words rushed out of Essek, so sure and confident. “Like...like if you do it, it’ll be fine. The guilt and hurt will die and you’ll be better. Even if it hurts, it’s okay because you’re better.”

“No.” Yasha cut him off, feeling like the word was all that stopping Essek from spiraling down whatever...whatever hole had made him think doing _this_ to his hands was a good idea. “No, Essek. I didn’t do it because I deserved it.”

 _Oh._ Essek’s face dropped. Yasha thought she could see him retreating, hiding away like he did when they all first met. She had to tread carefully. She didn’t have Fjord’s silver tongue or Jester’s big heart. But she was the one talking to Essek now - and possibly, the one who knew what was going on in his mind the most.

“I deserved to feel guilty. I deserved to feel responsible for what I had done. But I didn’t deserve putting harm to myself in order to feel better.” She tried to catch his eye as she wound the bandage over his pointer finger. “Essek, _nobody_ deserves to harm themselves.”

Now she could watch the words aligning themselves in Essek’s mind. Yasha gave him time, carefully wrapping each finger with the roll of bandages before binding his palm. The cream squeezed between where the bindings overlapped and Yasha mashed it back into the skin. If Essek kept his hand in the gloves for the remainder of this trek, what little escaped would probably still keep him safe till his hands completely recovered.

“You were controlled. Your actions were not your own.” _Mine were_ went unsaid.

Yasha heard it all the same. “I think I’ve done some terrible things even when I wasn’t controlled.” Yasha changed to his other hand and caught his eye a second time. “I can’t wipe away what I’ve already done - it’s done. But, I can push forward, and do better. Leave behind me a better place than I had.”

There was a weight to those words that Essek couldn’t identify. So he said nothing, just watched Yasha tie the ends of the bandages at his wrist, leaving a small tail behind as she grabbed his gloves.

“That should help with the dryness and keep against the cold, so long as you keep the gloves on.” Yasha gaped the gloves open for Essek to carefully wiggle his hand inside. She raised an eyebrow at him and Essek cowed a small bit.

Essek cleared his throat to push through the tension. “I...I will be sure to be more careful in the future.” There was a bit of stiffness to his movements, but he was able to put the glove on without any pain.

He was surprised when Yasha shoved her fist in his space, her little finger sticking up - surprised and confused.

“I’ve seen Jester and Caleb do this.” She provided as way of explanation. “You wrap your little finger around mine and you promise.” Yasha stared him down. Somehow her finger was more intimidating, though. Essek swallowed, feeling his hands clench and unclench in her lap in time with his stomach.

He, he could do this. He _could_. He could be better, and start that with keeping a promise.

It was with a small wince that Essek hooked his little finger with Yasha’s. “I promise.” He declared. And he intended to keep it.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now that someone's reached out to Essek, Essek wants to return the favor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was written back and forth with [moonmoonandthemorrigan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonmoonandthemorrigan/pseuds/moonmoonandthemorrigan) using Facebook Messenger, because they are a wonderful piece of human that allows all my Critical Role thoughts become stories.

He should talk about it. Essek knows he should talk about it. About the scratching of his arm beneath the heavy coat and the scars that he caught a glimpse of the other night in the mansion when Caleb had pushed his hair back from his face and... when he'd caught a glimpse of his arms in the mansion with a Caleb that had looked bizarrely relaxed for the first time since the bath at the Xhorhaus. They had been far to distinct far to accurate and uniform to be accidental. And... After all, they were mirror images of each other--weren't they. They each knew how to methodically alter the body, methodically destroy the body while still having their body work. 

And he was rubbing them, those old scars again like he wanted to remove the skin again and again and again. Just watching him made Essek's hands clench up at the sides with the poorly hidden anxiety that he'd been trying to deal with since... since that time. But he'd promised.

He'd promised Yasha, that night when she'd taken the frostburn cream and helped him spread it across his dusky split knuckles and the welts that were slowly festering underneath his gloves. He'd promised Yasha and... for some odd reason, that desire not to disappoint Jester (or Caleb, for that matter) had spread to her. He'd promised not to try and freeze the warmth of the guilt and shame of his actions out of his hands by sticking them in places they shouldn't be. 

He should talk about it. But how could he? It wasn't as if...

"You are thinking very hard over there."

"It is my job to think very hard."

"I have found - our best ideas happen when we come together. As a group." Caleb slowed his pace to match Essek's, walking through these ruins because they didn't, couldn't know what such a heavy concentration of magic would do to his disgravita spell. Essek looked up ahead for Veth's no-doubt disapproving glance at the two of them, but the Nein were all marching ahead.

Only him left behind. Him and Caleb.

"So." Caleb wasn't looking at him, and Essek was grateful and mournful for it, "What are you thinking of?"

He could say nothing. Let them linger in this space where Essek is untrustful and unworthy. He could drift off to the side, brushing against the old worn rock just where his sleeves end and his gloves begin. He could lie, blame his nerves. He sees outs everywhere

"You were marked." Essek shoves out. "In more ways than one, I think."

Something odd passes across Caleb's face that looks halfway between pained and murderous.

"What do you mean?" Caleb is still not looking at him and he has the strange impulse to curl up into his mantle and he can feel his feet start to lift off of the ground before he physically stops himself.

He is the Shadowhand. He would not be weak, would not back down, not for this. Not for one of the few people he'd ever considered an equal. A friend. A... A friend. He would approach this on equal ground.

"You told me once that I was not born with venom in my veins. That it was like looking into a mirror. That the path to... redemption, I suppose... didn't become easier with self-hatred. And I..." Essek was almost certain that he was making a mistake but he soldiered on. "I wanted to make sure that you also knew that whatever you were marked by... It... The venom doesn't have to be cut out of your veins either... I believe Caduceus would have a better, more metaphor laden argument about reclaimed soil, but we are wizards. We work best in analytics... And someone once told me that outside pain sometimes made it easier to cry, to feel our inner pain, I... I don't want that for you."

"Not wanting what for me?" 

Essek wasn't sure what words he wanted to use but he knew that he was frustrated and that the sweat from the anxiety was freezing in his hair (again) and he wasn't going to stop it. 

"Never mind. It's..."

"Nein. What don't you want for me? You do not hide your opinions from me often, friend." 

Essek flinched. And he heard Caleb take a deep breath as if to take everything back. 

Essek wouldn't let him. "She was right. It was cathartic to feel like some justice was being done and that there was a relief that came from the idea that, even if I didn't confess or let anyone know, I was still paying penance. I was suffering because I knew that I had done wrong and I couldn't go back to my blessed ignorance. And I... I am having a hard time stopping myself from doing it, because even though it hurts and it's easier to cry, it feels so goddamn relieving and I don't deserve it. However,"

Essek allowed himself to float slightly off the ground as he brushed by Caleb again. He didn't even want to see his face as he passed. "I am also your friend and I do not want to see you hurting yourself."

Caleb's head turned on a swivel - in the darkness, Essek could see _so clearly_ the blue of his eyes, boring into him the same they did on a boat, one fateful night. The air tore from his lungs. Essek could only stare back, hoping Caleb would respond and let him breathe again.

"May...Maybe we should take a rest." Caleb called ahead. The Nein staggered ahead, furthest ahead were Beauregard and Veth. If Caleb's gaze was penetrating, this was being dissected alive - all his secrets bare. _What secrets he had left._ "We've been walking for a while - just, just a moment."

"Oh - are you okay? Are you still hurt?" Jester skitters over the ruins without trouble (because she is a fey in disguise, like her patron - Essek is still convinced of that.) and Essek can see her hands turning in the beginning of a Healing spell.

Essek wants to scream _yes_ He hurts so much and he just wants it to lessen, a little. But pain, his pain, doesn't work like that and what's more, Jester isn't talking to him, but to Caleb. Caleb, who reaches out and gives her a soft look as he stops her casting. "Nein, Blueberry. Just a little tired."

"Ok. But you should take the Rod of Hand-warming anyway."

"Veth and I will scout ahead." Beauregard's voice echoes down to meet them as Jester roots in her Haversack.. "Message you if we find anything. See ya in...fifteen minutes?"

There must be a look of acquiescence amongst the group because Veth and Beau walk ahead. Essek barely notices because Caleb puts a hand on his arm and pulls him even further back - back where a collapsed wall makes for a functional bench.

"What do you mean?"

"Your arms."

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It is almost instinct for Caleb to cross one arm over the other, to press through jacket and sweater and undershirt into the scars. He stops just short and effortlessly transitions into crossing them both together. Guarded. Walled in. Distant

His arms ITCH like he's being examined as Essek's eyes pass from his hair to his arms to the way that he's standing. He can't know. He can't possibly know. 

"What about my arms?"

Essek shifts uncomfortably as he slowly stops floating and sits on the outcropping of fallen ice he opens his mouth to say... Was? Caleb doesn't know but Etwas. Etwas personal und unbequem. Uncomfortable. 

"OH! Is he saying that THEY'RE SUPER HOT CALEB?" Jester has not only noticed that the two of them are over here by themselves but has actively flounced over a bright orange rod of handwarming in her hands. "because they totally are. Very sexy."

Essek's grin seems forced as he stares at Jester. "Yes, Very sexy." 

The bright, chaotic grin faltered as she noticed the strange tension in between the two of them. "Essek, are you okay?"

"I'm fine, Jester. Thank you." 

"Oh... okay..."

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The quiet of her words made Essek feel like he was drowning. His hands clenched and unclenched as he opened his mouth to say something else to her and then failed to find anything at all to say. She was chaos and friendship personified, bubbling with effervescent cheer. She... she shouldn't sound like that and He, Essek, had made her sound that way. Small and alone and...

"Jester," Caleb took the rod from her hands before wrapping his own long beautiful... his own hands around hers, "Danke, wirklich. Do you mind leaving me with him for a moment?"

"Oh? Is it something super secret--"

"Just something private, Jester. Please? We will be back in a few minutes." 

"Okay," the tiny voice was back and Essek wanted... he didn't know what he wanted just that he wanted to hurt and he rubbed his own glove on the side of his mantle, small shocks of pain against the blistered skin. No. He forced his hand to be still. He promised Yasha and... and Jester was far more observant than she looked. Later. 

Jester gave a weak smile as she tried to be subtle about wiping away a tear. She turned and started to walk away, slowly, sadly. 

"Jester," the word was out of Essek's mouth before he realized that he was going to speak. "I... I didn't mean to hurt you. I...Thank you for wanting to help... Truly." 

She nodded. "I'll see you guys in a minute." 

She was still walking a little slow but at least the melancholy was mostly out of her gait. It was selfish to want her to be there for this and to see him, actually see him, for who he'd become after that angry pustule of a conversation in Nicodranus. In her home, if he remembered correctly. For some reason, forgiveness from her rankled in ways that it didn't from Yasha. But he still craved it. 

Caleb watched her walk away too. Something sad and soft in his eyes as she sidled up to Fjord and started to bury under his arm. 

"She is a very good cleric."

"I know," Essek fiddled with the glove around his knuckles as he tried not to think about what would happen if Jester found out about how they'd left him. Tried not to think about sticking his hands back into the snow. Tried very hard. 

"What about my arms, Essek?" 

"They... I misunderstood, I'm sorry." 

"Essek... Nein. I want to know." 

Essek tried to look into the middle distance where the wall of the other side of the small cavern started to melt into the dark greys of his darkvision and Caduceus leaned against the wall cradling his hands around the teapot, eyes closed and slowly breathing. His voice was clinical and he wished for anything to be able to make it sound as soft and comforting as the other cleric. "The scars on them are deliberate. Spaced apart in functional rows and avoiding all the major arteries. I saw them and came to the wrong conclusion. I apologize. It was none of my business."

"You thought that I did them to myself?" There was a little hitch in the nervous laughter that Essek hated. It reminded him of the man bound before the court before he'd even opened his mouth. The breathiness was even worse, "You thought that I tried to..."

"To hurt yourself, yes. I came to the incorrect conclusion." Essek began to stand and felt Caleb's fingers curl around his wrist. He snatched it away. "It wasn't any of my business." 

"I never told you where they were from?" 

"No, and you're right it isn't my business to pry and..."

"Ikithon."

"Excuse me?"

"I did not do those to myself," Caleb's fingers brushed at the fabric underneath his fingers as his eyes shut tight. "I do not... I do not particularly want to have this conversation right now, but I will not leave you with the wrong impression."

Essek slowly sank down onto the bench next to him. "You do not have to tell me, if you prefer." 

"Danke, aber nein. I... It will explain a few things about why I know what I know. The marks on my arms are not self-induced. Once, I was," Caleb sat looking down at his boots as he spoke quietly, with a hoarseness that Essek wasn't sure came from deep emotion or the lack of water. "I am sure you have guessed by now that I once trained as a Vollstrecker and there was a reason that she knew meinen Name. I... I failed... but before I did so, before I hit the place where I broke... where I shattered... alone... Ikithon trains his students through pain and experimentation. When I was young, he used pieces of residuum and placed it into their arms to see how they and their magic would react to such torture..."

Essek felt something curdle in his stomach as he imagined a young Caleb alone in a room that looked like the deepest level of the Dungeon of Penance screaming as pieces of green stone were placed into his arms. Distantly, he wondered whether it had worked. 

"... he has recently found a better way to do so, but it was meant to be painful. We did not know what they were only that they burned when they went in and that when the cleric healed a thin layer of skin over them they moved and wriggled against the muscle and tore into the blood like they were trying to feed from our bodies. When he has no use for failed students he tears them out of the skin. That is what those scars are from." 

"Oh. I..." 

"That isn't... That isn't to say that there are not some of the kind you are referring to... But these ones are not self-inflicted."

The words falter as they're formed and Caleb looks up at Essek - at all of him, not just meeting his gaze. At the tension across his shoulders, at the flexing tendon he can feel below his grasp on Essek's wrist. At the clenching and unclenching of his other hand.

"What have you done, Essek?" His voice is so quiet, so...wary. Careful.

It's that duality again. He hates it, hates that he can see the worry in Caleb's face as it forms. But he is so, so grateful that it's directed at him.

"You know what I have done.... and," He consciously relaxes his hand in Caleb's. His own eyes clench shut as he tries not to hear the faint voice of the Umavi talking about vulnerability. Screaming distantly that he was a Thyless and should act like it, no strangers could know how weak the house was... ever... How weak he was... But this was Caleb, and he was.... Much less a stranger than she ever was. "I told you, I need it... needed it."

The bandages underneath the gloves crinkle slightly as he turns them palms upward like he was receiving a benediction. The small tail that dangles from underneath the fabric tickles the underside of his wrist and the chapped blisters just beneath them that couldn't quite get warm. Caleb's other hand brushed it softly and Essek felt like he wanted to cry again. He hated this conversation.

"Was passierte, mein Freund?" he said again his voice even softer and Essek wanted to damn him for the small tears that tried to escape from his eyes. 

"I was cold. I needed to be cold."

There was a furrow between Caleb's eyes now, mingling the cautious worry with the same determination that came with his spellwork. Like he was slowly teasing apart a puzzle in methodical and great detail. Essek wanted to hide. Wanted to rage. Wanted so much to tear the gloves and the bandages off of his hands and wrists again and plunge them so far deep into the snow that his fingers would never be able to work a spell again and he would never have to...

"Essek. Schau mich an." 

"What?"

"Look at me... Bitte. Why did you need to be cold?" 

"If I was cold, I didn't need to feel and... It's strange in hindsight, but... Shame and guilt are warm and I didn't deserve to be warm."

Essek's fingers twitched as Caleb's hands continued to hold them. It was almost to close... Too much. "So was rage. I didn't deserve to be angry either."

"Angry?"

"What does it matter? I didn't deserve to feel that way. I shouldn't have felt that way. So, I did what I thought would make me go back to the cold person who didn't feel anything and who could go back to his responsibilities."

Caleb is on his feet before he thinks to move. Essek is so close to him and he's just that enough shorter than him that Caleb ducks to meet his gaze. "Essek..." Caleb grips his hand not to keep him there - he holds them like artifacts. Treasures.

"It was foolish. I think a part of me knew that. I think a part of me didn't care." It stumbles out in a laugh caught between pity and hysterics. It makes the silence afterwards that much sharper.

"It felt good. So I did it again."

"I...It became my failsafe, I suppose. Storms on the horizon and me, little me, standing there without furs, without leathers. Waiting for the cold to sink inside."

 _That won't really help with the inside._ Is what he had said. In a moment of uncertainty and anxiety and yes, anger. Caleb nearly kicks himself but pushes it aside. He can and will deal with that later. Right now Essek is sniffling and pulling away - his steps faltering. Essek isn't as graceful on his feet as he is in the air.

"It doesn't matter. It doesn't. I...I was just a fool. I know that."

"You did something foolish." And Caleb holds him tightly. "That doesn't make you a fool. And it does matter, Essek. It matters to you, and so it matters." Essek doesn't pull away, but he doesn't step closer back.

Caleb has never been patient. _We are wizards. We deal with analytics._ He was trained and schooled to run the numbers and find the quickest answer. So he dives in, as he does with all things. "May I..."

His thumb rubs the fur lined edges of the gloves

Essek nods and Caleb slowly takes one off and places it squarely between his palms. They're warm and Essek almost wants to flinch and relax with how they burn almost like the frostbite over the bandages that Yasha had so carefully wrapped around his fingers. 

"Schiesse."

"I was a fool." 

"Nein. I forgot that we were outside. I should have waited until we were in the tower tonight." 

Caleb tore his own glove off of his hand with his teeth (Essek definitely was not watching with a strange thrill) and a small mote of flame danced between his fingers before dissipating into a warm glow around them. Caleb offered it to him and Essek very nearly refused only hesitating a moment before it settled in the warm glow of the other mage's palm. The hands carefully unwrapped his own and looked carefully at the blisters that his hands had become. Essek turned away from them. Just because he did it, didn't mean he wanted to look at them. 

"Have you put something on them?" The warm hand worried gently at his own fingers and there was something soothing about Caleb's rough hands against his own. 

"Yasha did." 

"I used to see this a lot when I was growing up. They probably could use some more tonight." His hands are moving strange, unpredictable paths across his knuckles and his palms and the back of his hands and he is mesmerized by both the patterns that Caleb is tracing and the small furrow that's reappeared in his forehead. 

"I'm sorry." 

"For what? You were hurting and in pain and tried to find a solution to it without hurting anyone else... But I... I do not like to see you in pain either."

"I made an assumption, I apologize."

"I am..." The furrow moves a bit as his fingers intertwine with Essek's as he tries to find his next words. Essek is certain that this should hurt beyond the strange ache that he feels within his joints, but it doesn't quite. Not yet. "I am... touched that you wanted to make sure that I was alright." 

"We should probably get going." Essek stood and Caleb rewrapped Essek's hand in the bandages and handing him his glove. Essek pulled it on a bit more roughly than perhaps he intended and felt the scratch against the few breaks in the skin that the bandages didn't cover. He needed to refocus. Aeor, Lucien, then... Essek glanced at Caleb from the corner of his eye shoving his own hands into his mittens, arms crossed, legs crossed, with a look of pensive irritation as he rolled the rod of hand warming between his own hands. Then he was going to help destroy the Assembly.

He felt a hand on his elbow and suddenly Caleb was back next to him, standing. "We'll get through this together, ja?"

A message from Veth saved Essek from answer, Caleb's eyes looking in another direction at the voice only he could hear. "Ah, Ja. We are all good to go. Stay where you are - we will come to you." When he comes back, Essek had used that time to begin down the hall.

He makes it up to Yasha before the group starts moving as well. She leans into his space enough that he can feel her arm press against him. She looks at him with the same softness as that night. The same softness in Jester's concern. The same softness as Caleb.

They'll get through this - all of it. See warmer days on the other side.


End file.
